“I am ready to leave tomorrow” assured Michel Barnier ten days ago. Already time for boxes? The Prime Minister will test the waters all this week by receiving at Matignon the leaders of the left-wing and far-right opposition parliamentary groups who are threatening to censor him.
This Monday morning, he welcomes for the first time the head of the deputies of the National Rally Marine Le Pen who, since the indictments at his trial on his assistants in the European Parliament, has raised his voice against the government and is raising the threat of a government censorship. “We will not accept that the purchasing power of the French is further reduced. It's a red line. And if this red line is crossed, we will vote for censorship,” the former presidential candidate has already warned.
In the afternoon, after having lunch with Emmanuel Macron, he will continue in particular with Mathilde Panot, leader of the rebellious deputies. “We are going to see this Prime Minister who we repeat has no democratic legitimacy,” she said on BFMTV on Sunday. A meeting for nothing? LFI plans in any case to table a motion of censure against the government with the Socialist Party and the ecologists, as part of the left-wing alliance New Popular Front.
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The Social Security budget test
A first full-scale test will arrive very quickly for the government camp: Tuesday, the Senate, dominated by a right-centrist alliance, should vote largely in favor of the draft Social Security budget for 2025. But its fate will then be in the hands of 14 parliamentarians – seven senators, seven deputies – responsible for finding a compromise text during a joint committee. The government camp will be in the majority, but nothing ensures that the “common base” will be agreed, because a key measure on the reduction of exemptions from employer contributions angers the Macronist troops.
If a compromise is found, the final text will be submitted for a final vote in both chambers, which will involve the use of article 49.3 by the government before the deputies. With a risk for the Barnier government of being overthrown before winter if the National Rally decides to vote on the motion of censure promised by the left.
“The risk of a Greek scenario”
“We are taking the risk of a Greek scenario,” lamented government spokesperson Maud Brégeon on Sunday in The Parisian.
“Who wants to give the French as a Christmas present for 2025 a deficit of more than 7% and interest rates that are soaring? “, she said again. “No one was elected to add crisis to crisis.”
